Resignation surprise

Up at eight on a grey sky day. I drove to St German's after breakfast to attend Mass and sign the baptismal register, as I'd been unable to on Saturday night and left with Churchwarden Peter a small gift for Basma. Fr Jarel mentioned Dean Richard Peers in the prayers, It seems that he announced his early retirement on Sunday morning. Somebody else mentioned it to me yesterday, but I thought they must have been mistaken. It seems the ordeal of enduring a vexatious complaint process which started during his time at Christchurch College Oxford has taken its toll on him. Only last week was he exonerated by a clergy disciplinary court and his accusers castigated. It's so sad for the diocese to lose a gifted priest in this way. He's not the first senior cleric to quit recently. Does the church know any longer how to care for and protect its pastors?

When I returned, Clare was already cooking an early lunch, as she had an afternoon eye appointment at UHW. After we'd eaten I drove her there, then returned and went for a walk. It drizzled most of the time while I was out, but I got back just as the rain got heavier. The rest of the day I spent watching episodes of 'This Town'. It's a moving portrayal of dystopian life in outer suburban council housing areas in East Birmingham and Coventry at the time when the IRA was active in the West Midlands, with a spy thriller story embedded in it, in addition to a story about young people's striving to make a break their inherited family scripts. Of particular interest to me is the portrayal of non institutional religion in their lives.

Post-op - day four

Clare cooked waffles for breakfast in honour of Rhiannon's stay, one of her favourites. The two of them went to the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama at lunchtime, to attend a play reading which is part of a drama student practical project. Clare got to hear about it as a member of the 'Connect' friends of RWCMD organisation. 

Student groups design and present several short plays for a specific little theatre venue (reproduced physically in the College), working with the real life theatre director and producer whose venue it is. At the end of the project, the plays are done in the intended location, the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill. It's a brilliant educational idea, as they can pause, analyse and reflect at each stage of the process with the help of staff and an actual theatre director, without being under the usual commercial time pressure of a real-time situation. It's a RWCMD innovation, now emulated by other performing arts places around Britain. As Rhiannon is keen on performing arts and design, we thought this would be of interest, and so she was!

A District Nurse came at the end of the morning, and agreed I was in a fit enough state to attend the wound clinic tomorrow. Later in the day she rang through with an appointment time. They may need me to attend daily for a while. I don't mind, as it allows me to structure my day to include a walk. 

After lunch and a siesta, I walked around Pontcanna Fields and visited Blackweir Bridge for the first time since the op. It was mild and the sun shone in a cloudless sky, and I felt pretty good, elated in fact, about being alive and this well, just four days into recovery. I walked two and  a half miles, and didn't feel exhausted afterwards.

Martin phoned me while I was out and told me about the sudden death of a near contemporary, John Lewis, Dean of Llandaff who retired in 2012. He had suffered from heart trouble while in office but regained health sufficiently to live out his three score years and ten. His death reminds me that I too am on borrowed time, more so, after six months of surviving in such an infection prone state. There's no telling how long we have to live. It's a matter of being grateful for what we get. Especially extra time, which is extra quality time, like today.

Candlemass, and news from home

I walked across Plaza san Rafael to get the car this morning just moments before the sun peeped over the horizon. I was a bit earlier than usual as I had to drive out to Mijas Golf village to collect Gordon the organist at Benalmadena, as Val, his usual lift, is up in Madrid this weekend. We arrived in Benalmadena in good time just minutes before we could get into the church. Gordon explained that the building complex was locked down with a timer overnight, so that even those who had keys couldn't get in before nine o'clock. This was a consequence of a break-in some time back. It gives the welcome team just half an hour to get everything ready before the service starts. 

Afterwards, Gordon guided me uphill to the nearest motorway exit, so that I could make haste on the motorway and take him back to Mijas Golf before going to St Andrews for the service there. It worked fine, and I arrived with eight minutes to spare. I imagine that in the holiday seasons the coastal trip back from Benalmadena would be slower, less predictable, and the added 20 minutes to take Gordon back to Mijas Golf would be out of the question. It doesn't happen all that often, however.

There were nearly sixty at Los Boliches, long stay visitors from Colorado and Belgium among them. As it´s Candlemass today, I preached about the ministry of old people in relation to children, and was surprised by the favourable comments I had afterwards. I stopped and chatted with people for a good while, so it was gone three by the time I sat down to lunch. The earlier morning start took its toll, and a siesta snooze was called for before I was ready to return to the office for a session on Skype with Clare and then Rachel.

I had an email from Archbishop Barry announcing the appointment of his Chaplain Fr. Gerwyn Capon as the new Dean of Llandaff. From his present role, there's nothing about the problems and difficulties of the past year that Gerwyn isn't aware of, and he's already a familiar figure to the Cathedral staff, Chapter and church members. Let's hope and pray that everyone will now pull together behind his leadership to restore the credibility of the place in the eyes of church people and Cardiffians, shocked and disconcerted by the events of the past nine months. That's vital if the institutuon is to recover from its financial difficulties.

Obsequies

I admit that thinking about the Dean of Llandaff's resignation has much exercised my mind today, even if I am on the sidelines with no possibility of making a difference to the outcome. Whatever happens, the services will continue, children will be baptized and nurtured, people will get married and the dead will be sent from church to their resting place. 

At lunchtime my place was in St Mary's Whitchurch, welcoming the family and friends of Ivor Broad, the father of my friend Julia, for his funeral service. People from Cardiff who remember him as a friend or colleague, as well as from London West Yorkshire and Divonne les Bains in France, came together for his funeral, prepared entirely by his priest daughter. There were around eighty people present. The Rector Canon John Rowlands, who'd already done a funeral on this his day off, welcomed everyone, and opened and closed the service, leaving me to introduce the readers and readings, reflect and pray.  As we led Ivor's coffin into church, we commiserated with each other about the resignation of the new Dean.

It all went as it was intended to, and after the Committal at Thornhill Crem, there was a reception just up the road at Manor Park Hotel, where co-incidentally I dined last year with friends Michael and Barbara Bell from Geneva. It provided an opportunity to relax for a while and chat with extended family members before making my way home through rainy Friday afternoon traffic. So glad that complex arrangements worked to everyone's satisfaction. I have another funeral on the horizon for next Friday already. Today I heard of a parish priest in this city's costa geriatrica who sometimes does fifteen funerals a week. How?